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An Aboriginal elder from the Northern Territory is demanding an apology from former federal environment minister Peter Garrett as Midnight Oil kicks off its first Australian tour in 15 years.
In 2009, Mr Garrett allowed mining giant Glencore to divert a section of the McArthur River in the Gulf of Carpentaria near Borroloola to allow it to expand a zinc mine.
The decision was opposed by many Aboriginal people in the area, including senior elder and artist Jack Green.
He has now finished a painting titled Beds Are Burning/Mine On Fire, which he said he would send to Mr Garrett.
"I want to say to Peter Garrett that he should recognise this country has been damaged," Mr Green said.
"We told him, 'if you do this it's going to agree to this diversion, it's going to create a lot of problems. Fish are going to be damaged, the country's not going to be good'."
But Mr Green said he knew that Mr Garrett would sign off of the river diversion.
"Right or wrong, he was going to do it," he said.
"We've got song lines, we've got everything, he just wouldn't listen, he just wanted to sign off and now he wants to go back and do Midnight Oil in Darwin. What a shame.
"He should have been ashamed of what he done to Aboriginal people in Borroloola."
Midnight Oil launched the Australian leg of the global tour in Alice Springs on Monday night, and are due to play in Darwin on Wednesday.
Before the Alice Springs concert, Mr Garrett said Oils fans would have to look at him "warts and all" after his nearly decade-long stint in federal politics.
The band played some of their anthems promoting Indigenous land rights and environmental issues, such as Beds Are Burning, Truganini and The Dead Heart.
But the band has now lost at least one fan because of Mr Garrett's decisions made when he was a minister.
"I really loved Midnight Oil when they first started, but after what he did to this McArthur River I feel no good about him," Mr Green said.
"I was just hoping that he'd feel shame for what he'd done, but I don't think he'd feel shame.
He want to come back and prove it to everyone in Australia that he can do something and get away with it."
Topics: music, arts-and-entertainment, mining-industry, mining-environmental-issues, indigenous-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander, borroloola-0854, nt
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